Pretend
by SgtMac
Summary: Tamara and Greg have Regina. One wants magic, the other revenge. The only thing standing in the way of their plans is a curious connection between Emma and Regina. SQ. Based on the promos for the last 4 eps of Season 2.


A/N: Hunh. Well, promos put strange thoughts into your head and then you have to work them out and well then, there's this.

This is based on the promo for the last 4 eps of the season so if you haven't seen it and don't wish to be spoiled, probably best not to be read on.

Warning: Some mild language, and yes, some ugly though non-graphic torture scenes.

Story Note: Supposes a S1 relationship occurred between Regina and Emma of the sexual/nearly emotional variety.

Enjoy?

* * *

The first jolt brings on an almost strange kind of morbid curiosity. It's certainly painful - almost beyond the telling of it - but it's also surprisingly cold. She'd have thought that having electricity pumped into her body thanks to two little glowing probes attached to her temples would feel hot and like she was being burned from the inside out, but it doesn't; it feels like ice water is being poured into her veins, causing them to freeze almost upon contact.

And then she feels the other thing.

The yanking. The pulling.

The extracting.

This device, whatever it is, it's trying to pull her magic out of her by force. It's failing, but damned if it isn't trying. Damned if it doesn't hurt like hell all the while.

She grits her teeth to try to stop herself from screaming, her muscles tightening beneath the force of the electricity.

When the second jolt hits her, the curiosity flees, replaced by fear.

Not of death but of something so very much worse than that.

The fear of being broken.

* * *

_"Morning, Your Mayorness," she hears, the simple word mumbled into the warm flesh of her neck. A wonderfully muscular arm is wrapped tightly around her waist, and she can feel softness against her back._

_Regina answers immediately, almost without thinking, "I hate it when you call me that," she says, the words slipping easily from between soft lips._

_She feels the vibration of a chuckle against her neck. "I know. But you're hot when you're annoyed. I like it when you're hot." The words are clumsy and utterly without romance, and yet Regina feels warmth spread through her, starting in the middle of her chest and shooting outwards in all directions._

_"Yes, well, eloquent as always," she stammers. She forces her eyes open, then, and is immediately assaulted by a wall of bright white light. It fills her vision completely, blinding her for several long seconds. She blinks repeatedly, and finally the light falls away, away like a curtain being pulled back._

_Which, of course, is when she encounters another curtain. This one bright yellow and tickling away at her cheeks and nose._

_"Em-ma," she sighs._

_"I hate it when you say my name like that."_

_"Fine. Emma."_

_"What?"_

_"Your hair."_

_The words are said gently, but with a note of exasperation. Regina reaches up and pushes several strands away from her mouth, wondering not for the first time if it's actually possible to get a hairball as a human being._

_Emma's certainly attempting to help her find out. Turns out that the sheriff's hair is just as obnoxious and infuriating as she herself is._

_"Sorry," Emma replies just before she nuzzles herself closer to her bedmate. A light only slightly apologetic kiss is pressed into the spot just behind Regina's ear. The arm that had been around her waist slides up her torso._

_Regina shivers, but finally manages to reply with a slightly throaty, "Yes, so you say. You need to…you need to get up, dear."_

_"Mm. No. Don't want to. Want to stay right here."_

_"You need to," Regina repeats. She thinks that she should probably roll away from the sheriff, force the blonde out of the warmth of the bed, but there's something inside of her that refuses to do so. Something that tells her that she doesn't actually want Emma to be anywhere but right here._

_"Why?" Emma whines, the sound so pathetically petulant that Regina can't help but chuckle. She reaches down, catches one of the hands that is wrapped her midsection and brings it to her lips, earning a moan of approval, and then a soft kiss of reciprocation along the column of her neck._

_"Well, because one of us still has a job," Regina reminds her before things can start to get heated. "One of us also has a family that will be wondering where you've been all night. I'm not sure on patrol will work in this town."_

_"So, I'll tell them the truth. I'll tell them that I was right here. In bed and very naked with you," Emma answers with an impish grin, the uptick of her lips warm against Regina's neck. In spite of herself, the former mayor sighs because yes, it does feel good to be right where she is. In Emma's arms._

_Where it's peaceful and calm, and absolutely nothing can hurt her._

_"I don't think they'd appreciate that," Regina finally answers._

_"Ask me if I care."_

_"The only reason you don't care is because you haven't yet had your morning coffee. Once you have and you come to your senses, you'll freak out as you usually do." Regina reminds her, her voice soft and gently teasing. Beneath the words, though, is something deeper; a sense of sadness and loss that she can't hide no matter how much she wishes that she could._

_Because the very simple truth is that in a few minutes, Emma will be up and out of this bed._

_"Possibly," Emma admits with a faint smile. "But since I haven't done any of those things just yet, how about we just go with it for now. You close your eyes and I close mine and we –"_

_"Pretend," Regina finishes dully._

_There's a rustle of sheets as Emma turns the older woman around so that they're facing each other, just about nose to nose. "Pretend," she agrees before leaning forward and pressing her lips ever so lightly against Regina's._

_"What if I don't want to?" Regina answers once the kiss is broken. She reaches up and touches Emma's cheek, cupping pale skin within her palm. She trails a fingertip down a perfect cheekbone, and then back up it, the touch light and almost sensual._

_"You need to," Emma tells her, and there's an odd almost desperate urgency to her tone now. Her green eyes have widened, and her expression has turned from one of sleepy amusement to one that almost looks like fear. "You need to pretend and you need to stay right here with me. You need to hold onto me, and let me hold onto you. Okay?"_

_"I don't…I don't want to be anywhere else," Regina tells her, confusion clouding her eyes. "You're the one who's going to leave. You're the one who always leaves."_

_"Then don't let me."_

_Regina shakes her head. "I can't make you stay. Don't you think I would if I could?"_

_"You can," Emma insists. "If you stay right here with me."_

_"Emma, what are you talking about? I don't understand."_

_"You will," the sheriff says, and she suddenly seems so sad. So very sad._

_"Emma…"_

_It happens so quickly, then; the room fills with bright white light again, and then her head hurts._

_And she feels cold._

_Like ice water has been poured through her veins. _

* * *

"You've returned," the boy – twenty-nine years older now - says from above her. He's gazing down at her with a kind of cruelty in his eyes that she knows well; it's the look a predator gets just before it tears its unfortunate prey apart. There's curiosity and intrigue and then there's nothing but pain.

"Why?" she stammers out, her dry throat catching the word several times and turning it into a raspy croak instead. A sharp point jolts up her spine and settles in the base of her skull. She feels sweat dripping down her face, and the area where the probes are attached is hot and itchy. She wonders if she has burn marks there, and then assumes that she does.

"Why am I doing this? I'm doing this because you took something from me," he tells her and she thinks of a precocious little boy with a big smile and bright eyes. She remembers tears running down his cheeks and she recalls lifting her hand to touch his and being stopped by the border around Storybrooke. Around her little town created through hatred and fury.

"I'm sorry," she says quietly, and she honestly is. She was sorry, then, too. Not that it matters, anymore. His eyes are dark and cold and she sees herself in them.

She sees her creation and thinks of Rumple, and how he'd built her.

"I no longer want your apology," he tells her, and she finds it hard to blame him, which surprises her because she's never been one much to understand anyone else's pain. Not when her own is as strong and self-destructive as it has always been. There's never been time nor space to care for another. "That words mean nothing to me anymore."

"I know," she admits.

A tear trickles down her cheek, spilling hot over icy skin.

"What are you doing to me?" she asks after a few seconds of nothing but him staring at her.

"I told you: I'm taking something away from you."

"My magic."

"Yes, but first," he nods, his lips curling into a snarl. "I'm going to make you hurt as much as you hurt me. I'm going to make you scream for every night that I went to bed praying that my father would wake me up in the morning. And then when you can't scream anymore and when all your magic is gone and all you have left is the monster that you are, then I'll take your life."

"Don't do this," she says, so quiet and tired.

He laughs, his disbelief clear to her ears. "Now you plead for your life?"

"No. Yours."

They're the wrong words to say, but they're also completely the right ones as far as she's concerned. A moment later, though, when the energy is bleeding into her once more and the strange pulling sensation begins anew, she wonders why it is that the need for truth and honesty seems to come only at the end.

He turns the dial, his eyes on her, and yes, she sees herself reflected back at her.

The pain intensifies and then, she gives him what he wants: she screams.

* * *

_"There you are," Emma breaths, the relieved sounding voice reaching her ears before the bright white light recedes enough to allow her to see that she's once again lying in her own bed, facing the still naked sheriff. The blonde is frowning, her brow wrinkled and her green eyes wide and worried. She lifts a hand to touch Regina's face, rubbing the back of her knuckles against feverish skin._

_"I am," Regina replies. "How? I don't understand."_

_"You don't need to. You just need to understand that you're safe here."_

_"But this isn't real, is it? You're not real. Is this a dream?"_

_"Yes and no. And I'm as real as you need me to be."_

_"Emma…"_

_"Listen to me," Emma says urgently. "You've got to hold on. Just a little bit longer, okay? I'll come for you; you know I will."_

_"No, you won't. Because you're not you," Regina says softly. "Outside of here, outside of whatever this is, we don't exist anymore." She laughs. "I don't think we ever did."_

_She's answered by a hard almost possessive kiss on the lips; the passion and desperation clear to her in equal measures. Hands roughly cup her face as the kiss deepens, threatening to become more._

_Except that she's absolutely certain that this is just a dream._

_Not even a dream._

_A delusion brought on by pain and well-deserved torture._

_"No," she hears. "You don't deserve this."_

_She doesn't even bother to ask how Emma knows what she's thinking; this whole thing is absurd enough._

_"Don't I?" Regina counters. "I did this to him. I made him."_

_"We make ourselves," Emma insists, and Regina muses about just how much this Emma Swan truly does sound like her actual self._

_Regina presses her forehead against Emma, enjoying the warmth that bleeds out. "I took his father from him same as my mother took Daniel from me. All because what I wanted mattered more. I turned him into this."_

_"So you'll die to make amends?"_

_"I don't know what else to do. I'm not sure I know how to live anymore."_

_"No. Listen. You have to fight. You have to come back to me."_

_"There is no you, Emma. There hasn't been a you in my life for a very long time. The real you doesn't believe in me anymoe. She probably never did."_

_"I do. And I will find you."_

_"You sound like your father. Please don't."_

_"I'm serious."_

_"I know you are, but you won't. Not in time," Regina replies. "And that's okay."_

_"It's not," Emma insists, her green eyes brimming with tears. Regina wonders for a moment about the narcissistic melodrama of her own mind. How strange to have created an Emma Swan for herself that would cry about the former queen's downfall and eventual end. The real Emma, well the last words that they'd spoken to each other had been in anger about Henry._

_Nothing good left there._

_Not anymore._

_And yet the Emma that holds her close now, the one who seems real enough to smell and share air with, there are tears on her pale cheeks. She keeps pressing her lips against Regina's skin, like if she stops kissing and touching, then maybe Regina will just fade away._

_Or fade back to reality._

_"Just let me stay here," Regina pleads. "I don't care what happens next. Let me stay here with you."_

_"As long as you need. But just so I can help you hold on."_

_And then the lips are on hers again. She closes her eyes and pulls Emma closer, feeling the intense heat of the blonde's body against hers._

_It's a dream, she tells herself, but that doesn't stop her from accepting the comfort and the passion._

_Until she sees white again. _

* * *

"Drink this," Owen orders, holding out a blue plastic cup. The sloshing fluid inside of it is clear and without bubbles, and she imagines that it's just water because anything else – including some kind of poison – would almost be merciful.

She tries to lift her hand, but her muscles suddenly seize, and all she can does is grind her teeth and clench her jaw as icy cold pain cuts through her. A sound – like a rumbling moan – tears from her throat, followed by a hoarse gasp.

And then she falls still again.

"Drink," he demands once more.

She lifts her bleary bloodshot eyes up to him. "I can't."

"I won't let you die this soon," he tells her, his head cocked to the side, a strange and disconcerting smirk playing at his lips. "If that's what you're thinking, then stop. You haven't suffered enough."

"I know."

"Beg for your life," he says, stepping closer. "Beg for mercy."

"It won't make you feel better if I do."

"Yes, it will."

She smiles sadly. "No, it won't. Nothing ever will."

His face contorts, but she's too tired to notice it. Her eyes slip shut. It's only the feel of icy water against her face – chilled liquid on cold skin – that makes her blink and look up at him again. She sees familiar rage there.

"You owe me," he growls.

"And you have my life; so take it."

"Beg me not to."

"No."

"You owe me," he says again.

"I do, but not like this. I won't give you that."

"Then give me my father back!"

"I can't," she tells him, tears in her eyes.

He screams something incomprehensible at her, pulls back his hand, and starts to drop it towards her face with all of the fury he feels inside of himself. She braces, awaits and then exhales when the sure to be pulverizing hit never comes.

"No," she hears, and there's her other captor – Tamara, she's called.

"I want her to pay." He's practically sobbing.

"She'll pay, Greg," Tamara soothes, running her hand up and down his arm in a way that Regina recognizes well; it's seduction for dummies. Tamara owns this boy, and is controlling him through his anger and raw pain. In a rather sick way, Tamara is Rumple and Owen is Regina, and damned if the cycle isn't playing out again.

"I want her to beg for her life," he says, broken by his pain in a way that makes Regina's heart clench. She's felt regret and remorse for very little in her rage-darkened life – really, what's the point of weeping over sins that you can no longer correct – but for this, she feels these things immensely. "I want her to beg for forgiveness," Owen babbles out.

"She will."

Regina holds her tongue, doesn't bother to correct the woman. It's not that she wouldn't do those things if they would actually help Owen, but she knows they won't. As a Queen, she'd heard many a desperate man beg for his life, and it had never once filled her with compassion nor forgiveness; simply rage at the weakness of the pathetic creature bowed down before her.

"We need her magic first, baby," Tamara tells him, moving her hand up to his face. She scratches at his dark stubble, and then runs a finger over his lower lip.

"And then?"

"And then, I promise you that you can make her pay until she gives you everything you want. Everything." She punctuates her words with an especially cruel smile.

He nods his head slowly, sullenly. He wipes roughly at his tears, looking so very young and for a moment, all Regina sees is the child she tried to keep.

The child she broke.

"Good," Tamara says. Another swipe past his lips gets her a soft kiss on the tip of her thumb. "Now go up-top and check on Hook. I don't trust him."

"And her?"

"I need to get her magic. You need to take a breath and get yourself back under control. She'll be here when you get return, I promise," the beautiful woman assures him. "Don't worry; I'd never take that from you."

Owen offers her the smallest of smiles, then turns and leaves, his footsteps loud up the wooden stairway. A door above closes loudly, clicking shut.

"I have nothing to give him," Regina says, wary eyes rising.

"I know that, and you know that," Tamara agrees. "But rage does funny things to a person, wouldn't you agree, Your Majesty?"

"You know of me. How?"

"Hook. And Neal. And your magic is well, is classic too obvious?"

In spite of herself, in spite of the monstrous pain that she's in, Regina chuckles because this woman could give her darkest self – the Evil Queen herself - a run for her money. "Yes, dear," she answers. "It is."

"Shame," Tamara sighs. She turns to look at the control box, and frowns. "I think you're holding back. Seems like you're mostly just giving us sparks instead of real magic. Care to change that?" Her words are almost mocking.

"Not really," Regina answers.

"Didn't think so. Had to ask, though. You understand, right?"

"What do you plan to do with my magic once you have it?"

Tamara shrugs her shoulders. "Sky's the limit, isn't it?"

"You realize that the people of this town won't just let you walk all over them. They will stop you."

Tamara laughs. "You mean the Swan woman. Emma."

Regina smiles widely, despite the pain it causes. "Exactly."

"Oh, this is interesting, isn't it? The way I hear it, she's your enemy. Why would you root for her to do anything besides die?"

"She's not my enemy. She's my opposite, dear; there's a difference."

"Well, I'm pretty sure if I can take you down, I can handle her."

"Good," Regina nods, eyes slipping shut. "Believe that; it'll make it easier for her to destroy you as she did me."

"You said she was your opposite, not your enemy. And yet like you said, she destroyed you. That makes no sense."

"Perhaps not, but this should: I respected her. You don't. You're a fool."

It's unwise to taunt your captors when all they have are sticks and stones; it's a decidedly worse idea to do so when these same captors intend to forcibly rip something as elemental as magic from your body.

She realizes this a moment later when the pain starts again.

And then she wonders whether she's laughing or screaming.

Maybe she's doing a little bit of both.

* * *

_"You have to stop," Emma insists as she walks in anxious circles around the bedroom, her bare feet turning sharply against the light colored carpet. She's dressed in pajama bottoms and a tank top, the bottom of it curling up to reveal her well muscled abs._

_"Stop what?" Regina queries from where she's lying on the bed, too tired to do much more than raise her head to watch as her lover paces._

_"Stop taunting them."_

_"I'm not."_

_"You are!"_

_"I am," Regina admits. "But you have to admit; she is a fool."_

_"Regina, please! This isn't a joke. They're going to kill you."_

_The former mayor lifts her chin. "Not anytime soon. Not until they have my magic and they still haven't figured out how to get it from me just yet. Besides, I thought you said you'd come for me." She chuckles when she says these last words, darkly amused._

_"You have to give me time and if you keep pissing everyone off, there isn't going to be time. Why can't you understand this?"_

_"I do," Regina chuckles. "I just don't believe." She taps her chest. "You're my heart, dear; you want to me to have faith in a grand rescue because you want to believe that there's something in me worth saving." Her hand lifts up to her temple, and then she taps there as well. "But this knows better. I know better."_

_"No! You're wrong. I'm here. Me, Regina. Me."_

_"You're not her," Regina corrects with a sad shake of her head. "I have no idea why my brain is trying to convince me that you are, but you aren't her. And you're not coming for me. Not until it's too late, anyway."_

_Emma steps forward suddenly, the motion awkward and gawky and so very Emma that it almost makes Regina startle from its sheer authenticity._

_"Why would you make me your safe place? Explain that."_

_"Is that what this is? A safe place?"_

_"Are you hurting here?"_

_"Yes." She extends a hand. Emma's fingers slide into her own. "Because this is everything I've ever wanted. And it's all just…escapism."_

_"You want me? After everything we've been through. After everything we did to each other. You still want me?" There's a hint of surprise in the question, but also a challenge, like she's trying to force Regina to admit something._

_"I want strength. I want love. I want peace."_

_"And you think I can give you those things?"_

_Regina chuckles. "I think this is a very odd conversation to be having with myself and that Dr. Hopper might have a field day with me if I survive this."_

_"If? So you still have hope?"_

_Regina blinks and looks up at the blonde woman. "You're still here."_

_"So you still have hope," it's a statement this time, and not a question._

_"Well," Regina sighs. "I never did learn from my mistakes." _

* * *

"You're strong," Tamara muses, her fingers rolling almost absently against the dial on the control box. "And you're fighting back. Why? Why bother when you know how this will end?"

Wary eyes lift up again. Regina coughs. Once. Twice. A third time.

"Do you need water?"

A half-hearted glare is her only response.

"I'll take that as a yes."

A few moments later, cold water is pressed against her chapped and cracked lips. The fluid hurts badly going down her parched throat, but it also causes it to unclench enough for words to finally break through.

"I won't let him kill me," she says, eyes dark and defiant.

"Greg."

"Owen."

"Don't you think you owe him that?"

"Not that."

Tamara chuckles. "I can't decide if you think you're being noble by refusing him his vengeance in the name of misguided heroism or if you think your life is worth more than his. Tell me, Your Majesty, which is it? Are you too good to die?"

Regina laughs. "You really are a fool."

"Am I? I'm not the one screaming out the name of the woman who broke my curse and stole my son. That would be you."

"At least I know better than to underestimate her."

"You wouldn't be here if you did," Tamara retorts.

"Well, then, some mistakes I do learn from." She laughs to herself, drawing a surprised and slightly worried look from Tamara. "What's wrong, dear? Don't want to have to deal with a crazy woman in her final hours?"

"I have no problem sedating you."

"Of course you do. You need me conscious in order to draw out my life force. You need me awake in order to steal my magic. Otherwise, it could hide inside of me, burrow deep. That's why you stop every time I pass out. You need me to let my magic out because until I do, all you're getting from me is as you said: sparks. Which are useless to you, aren't they?"

"You're smarter than you look."

"And you're far stupider."

"You're trying to make me kill you," Tamara grinds out, between clenched teeth. Her fingers twitch against the control box.

"Well, yes. Gods know, it'd certainly be better than listening to you ramble along like a self-indulgent idiot out of a bad movie. Really, I thought Emma might at least have her hands full dealing with you, but now I suspect that even her moron parents could take you down without much effort. Perhaps just her father alone." The words take everything she has to spit out, each one more painful than the last but she holds eye contact the entire time.

Taunting. Mocking. Daring.

Refusing to be broken by this woman.

She's not worthy.

Tamara steps closer. "Do you want to know what I plan to do with your magic?"

"Start a fireworks company of your own?" It's lame, but she's terribly tired and for some reason, the pathetic nature of the joke makes her think of Emma, and that makes her smile far more than the situation currently warrants.

"I'm going to kill everyone in this town."

"Have fun. I've been trying to do that for decades. Word of warning: they don't die easily."

Tamara leans in, showing off a row of perfectly white teeth. "Starting with your precious little Savior. Your Emma who you keep calling out for."

"Mm. You really should start with Granny instead," Regina responds, almost lazily. Everything inside of her hurts, but there's a point to all of this, she reminds herself. "She might be more your speed. On the other hand, she is awfully good with a crossbow so perhaps you'd like to start with Thumper. I believe he goes by Peter Jones here."

Tamara ignores her, leaning even further down, close enough for Regina to smell her spicy and not terribly pleasant perfume. "And when I'm done ripping the Savior apart, maybe then I'll move onto your son."

Regina's eyes widen, and all of her cool detached defiance falls away, shifting rapidly into panicked fear and raging fury. She wrenches against her restraints, growling as her exhausted and dehydrated muscles flutter. Purple suddenly swirls in her eyes, growing and surging as magic tears through her blood, causing her skin to ripple. "If you touch him –"

Tamara laughs, cutting her off.

And in that moment, she knows that her emotions have once again betrayed her, given her away and exposed her magic to an evil that is far greater than herself. Her own is driven by pain and anguish; Tamara is ruled by ambition and indifference. She reminds Regina entirely too much of her mother. Involuntarily, a shudder tears through her wounded frame, shaking her fiercely.

"There we go," Tamara chirps almost cheerfully, her smile widening manically. "If I'd know that that was all it took to make you fire up, I would have mentioned the little bastard a long time ago." She stands back up, and turns to the control box, touching the dial with the tips of her fingers. "It's amazing; for such a strong woman, you have such an obvious weakness."

_Love is weakness, Regina._

Turns out Mother was right again.

Tamara reaches behind her, picks up what looks like a flat piece of wood, and then jams it forcibly into Regina's mouth, the edge of it cutting sharply into the brunette woman's lip. Regina tastes the tang of blood for just a moment before the bitterness of the makeshift bite overwhelms her. "You're going to need this," her captor tells her with a smirk.

She spins the dial, then, turning it up to high.

The pain is unfathomable, beyond words, beyond all reasonable thought.

Regina tries to cry out, but her raw and tormented throat catches violently and all she can do is surge forward against her bindings, her mouth open wide, her eyes staring straight ahead, unseeing and wide.

She thinks of Henry and Emma.

She screams for both of them.

Nothing comes out.

* * *

_"No," Emma snaps out the moment Regina's eyes open and they're staring at each other from across the room. "Love is strength."_

_"Until it destroys you," Regina counters. "Until it makes you into me."_

_"Dammit, why are you trying to die?" Emma growls, stalking towards her. She's dressed now, wearing her trademark indigo skinny jeans and a black hoodie. She looks tired and edgy, her limbs a bundle of uncontrolled energy and anxiety._

_"I was trying to stop her from taking my magic," Regina answers weakly, already so very tired of this._

_"By dying? What the fuck kind of plan is that?"_

_"You don't understand what someone without control could do with my magic. Even I had limits, lines I wouldn't cross unless I absolutely had to. She has none, Emma. She will kill every creature in this town. You. Henry."_

_"You'd know I'd never let that happen. You know that!"_

_"I don't think you can stop her. My magic is strong. Yours is, too, but mine is…mine is matured and old and very angry."_

_"Then we stop her and your old-ass magic together, but I need to find you, Regina. Time is running out. I need you to think."_

_"Why?"_

_"Because I don't know where to start." Emma strides towards her, places a hand on each side of her face, and forces eye contact. "I don't know where else to look. We checked your office and your house and... I need you to think. Tell me where you are. Please."_

_"In a room. On a table."_

_"Good. That's good. What's the room look like?"_

_"You're my mind, Emma. You can see what I see."_

_"Pretend I'm not," Emma sighs, exasperation in her tone. "Pretend for five seconds, Regina, that I am who I say I am. What do you see around you?"_

_"Wood walls. Looks like a cabin of some –" she stops._

_"What? What is it?"_

_"Hook. I heard them say he was up above and...he's the one who knocked me out, I think. I...I think he brought me here."_

_"Are you serious?"_

_Regina rolls her eyes. "If I survive this, I think I'm going to have to let the Cricket off the hook; Gods know I'll need someone to give me good drugs."_

_"Not funny."_

_Regina shrugs, then: "Yes, I'm serious. I think I'm on his ship. I don't believe my captors trust him, however."_

_"Hard to blame them. I'm gonna kick him in the balls when I see him."_

_Regina nods her head. "Well, that sounds like me and you."_

_"Yeah, well, that's because it is you and me."_

_"Of course it is."_

_Emma sighs. "We don't have time for this. Listen to me, okay? I need you to hold on. Just a little bit longer. I'm going to bring you home, but you have to hold on. And you have to control yourself. You can't let her take anything else from you, all right?"_

_"My dear," Regina drawls. "I'm not sure there's much more to take."_

_"Your life, for one." Emma leans forward and presses a gentle kiss to her lips._

_"For whatever value that has," comes the soft reply._

_"It has value to me. And to Henry. To both of us. Hold on. And if you don't actually believe that I'm real, if you think that I'm just a figment of your imagination, fine, but pretend otherwise. Pretend I'm real. Give me time. I won't let you down."_

_Regina nods slowly, not quite believing, but hopeful all the same because what else is there left to her but to be?_

_"Well, then," she says, "You should hurry; I'm waking up again."_

_"I know."_

_Another kiss, a quick tight almost urgent hug, and then the room – her bedroom and Emma – are all fading away._

_And with the white light of pain comes reality. _

* * *

"Is she dead?" she hears, though it sounds like gibberish to her confused and disorientated brain. Her dark and badly bloodshot eyes are fixed wide and staring to the ceiling above her, but she sees almost nothing, just the whiteness of light and a cold kind of emptiness. She's been like this for at least ten minutes, not moving an inch. The wood bite has been removed, but if it were still within her mouth, she's not sure that she would have noticed anyway.

"No. And why are you down here?"

"I wanted to see the Queen," the voice answers. She recognizes it after a moment or two: Hook. Come to gloat, she figures.

"Well, you've seen her. Your job is to be up above standing guard."

"Do I need to remind you, love, that this is my ship? I'm only helping you because you promised to use some of that new magic of yours to help me kill my crocodile. Remember your promise."

"Oh, I remember. Now, do I need to remind you that I'm not afraid of you, Captain?" Tamara steps towards him, gazing right up into his blue eyes.

He laughs coldly, as unimpressed with her as she is with him. "Absence of fear isn't a good thing. If you screw with me, I'll ensure you're at the bottom of the ocean. Believe me that, love."

Tamara rolls her eyes. "What do you want, Hook?"

"As I said, I just want to see her. See for myself what state she's in."

"Then do it and be quick about it."

She turns then, and stalks from the cabin.

Hook waits until the door above closes, and then steps closer to the former queen. "You've done it this time, Regina. Really got yourself into one hell of a mess. The question is: how do you plan to get yourself out of it? I can't say I'm especially fond of our friends upstairs so perhaps you and I can come to a new agreement?"

She keeps staring upwards, doesn't move an inch.

Until she feels the metal of his hook upon her cheek.

"There you are," he says softly when she can't help but flinch. "Playing possum are we?"

Her head rolls to him, sloppy and uncoordinated. Unbefitting a Queen.

Just as he's about to say something more, they both hear a loud thump from up above, and then the sound of a gunshot. An explosion follows seconds later and then several more gunshots and what sounds like a splash.

Hook leans down close to Regina after a few seconds, lowering his voice. "Unless I'm greatly mistaken and our two crazies are into some serious kink, your rescue wagon appears to have arrived. I won't help them save you, but I won't stop them, either. It seems this is where we part company one way or the other. Good luck, Your Majesty. May we never meet again."

"Hook," she gasps out, shivering as she speaks.

He cocks his head. "What?"

"Go home."

His eyebrow lifts. "Three hundred years," he reminds her, his voice quiet.

"Not worth it," she answers thickly, just before her eyes roll back.

* * *

_She's alone in her bedroom._

_"Emma?" she calls out, sitting up on the bed._

_Silence._

_She stands up. "Emma?"_

_When she's once again greeted by the coldness of silence, she steps towards the door, and places her hand on the knob. She turns it but the door refuses to open. Even the windows are shut._

_And the room is so empty._

_Symbolically, metaphorically, whatever, she has no idea what the hell this is all about._

_All she knows is that Emma is no longer in the room with her._

_For whatever the hell that means._

* * *

Apparently, it means a lot.

"Over there," she hears, and then there are hands on her. Soft and gentle. She blinks and thinks she sees yellow hair.

"Is she –" a male voice asks.

"No, but she's hurt; we need to get her to a hospital."

"Whale," the same man – who sounds a lot like David – says.

"Can we trust him?"

"Emma?" she whispers, drawing all of their attention to her.

"Hey, there you are," Emma chuckles, sounding a whole lot like she's relieved and almost overjoyed.

"Emma," she repeats again, almost as if she's trying out the sound of the name. She tries to swallow, but ends up coughing roughly instead.

"Hey, hey, easy. I'm right here. You're okay now." Damp hair is gently brushed away from her sweaty temple.

"I held on," Regina mumbles. "I pretended."

"Yeah, you did," Emma nods. "You did." She presses her hands against Regina's heated cheeks. "And I came just like I told you I would."

"You did."

"Emma, what is she talking about?"

"It doesn't matter," the sheriff replies. "Go pull the truck around."

"You sure? I can carry –"

"Go. I got her." There's a pause, and then, "David, please. She needs help."

"Right." There's the sound of footsteps up the stairs and then it's just the two of them. She feels Emma releasing her from the binds, and then lowering her down to the ground, pulling the former queen into her arms. Hair tickles her cheeks and nose.

So very familiar.

"You're real," Regina breathes. "It was real? How?"

"I don't know, but I also know it doesn't matter."

"Love is weakness. Love is strength. I don't know. I don't understand." She's just babbling now, but she couldn't stop if she tried. It's like everything inside of her is just pouring out, incomprehensible and uncontrollable.

"Neither do I, but I do know this: it's okay now. It's all okay." She presses a kiss against Regina's forehead, and holds it there. She tightens her hold. "You're okay. We're okay. Okay? Okay."

And just like that, Regina feels everything slow down. Calm. Peace.

She exhales and breathes in Emma, so very close to her.

"Your hair," she says.

"Forgot to pull it back," Emma apologizes.

"It's okay. I thought I lost you," Regina tells her, shivering, the cold of the icy electricity that still runs through her blood more intense than she could have ever imagined possible.

"I thought I'd lost you, too, but I'm here now and so are you," Emma counters.

"We are." Her eyelids droop. "Henry. I need to…can she hurt him?" the brunette asks with the last of her strength.

"No. Not now. Not ever."

"Owen?"

"Isn't hurting anymore."

A rough sob bubbles up through her abused throat and bursts out past her lips. She gasps for air, but finds herself gulping for it, crying silently.

For decisions and choices that can't be unmade. For a little boy who deserved a better fate.

For a young girl who certainly deserved the same but ended up an Evil Queen anyway.

"Shh," she hears Emma say again.

The last thing she feels before she surrenders to the cold pain, and to the weakness within her heart and soul and to her inability to hold herself together any longer is Emma's arms wrapped tight around her. Strong. Warm. Protective.

Forgiving and perhaps even loving.

She pretends that that's enough.

For today, it actually is.

** -Fin**


End file.
